Clone remediation will help you bring clones into your grow room from outdoor plants or from outside sources (e.g. other people’s garden’s) without bringing in unwanted hitchhikers. There are bugs (e.g thrips & mites) as well as fungi (namely Powdery Mildew) that can inadvertently be brought in. Always look underneath the leaves to see what might be hanging out. Note that eggs and fungal spores cannot be seen with the naked eye.

I have developed a multi stage dip and clone quarantine process that is 95% effective. The only way to guarantee full remediation is either lab scale tissue culture (with laminar air flow and sterile conditions) or seeding the plants out and starting fresh. For home/hobby use this method works very well.

This takes care of both living pest, their eggs, as well as PM spores and any existing mycellium that has already colonized plant tissue.

This is a multi-stage approach:

1. KILL – Peroxide dip to kill any living organisms and destroy mold spores.
2. WASH – Potassium based salts. Rinse peroxide off and suffocate any surviving insects
3. NEEM – active compound Azadirachtin which interrupts insect reproductive cycle. Natural fungicide for PM spores. Coating oil effect similar to emulsified Suffoil style products
4. QUARANTINE – Any eggs that may have survived are killed during the quarantine stage by re applying a Neem Oil/Soap Spray every 2 days for 10-14 days.

Materials Needed:

• Cold Pressed Neem Oil
• Dr. Bronners Peppermint Soap (this is an awesome natural body soap too)
• 3% Hydrogen Peroxide (minimum 1L)
• Vegetable Safe Insecticidal Soap (Potassium salts of fatty acids)
• 1 Gallon Pressure Sprayer

Start by setting up your assembly line of products. I used wide mouth 1 quart mason jars since I can cap them off and re-use down the road. They also give ample room for dipping clones in. Fill the neem oil jar to 90% capacity. Add 10 mL of neem oil and 10 mL of Dr. Bronners soap. Shake vigorously for 1-2 minutes to emulsify the oil. The picture on the left is non emulsified (drops of oil visible) while the picture on the rights is a properly emulsified oil. The soap acts as a surfactant allowing the oil and water to become miscible – similar to how lecithin in egg yolks turns water and oil into mayonnaise.

Stage 1: Hydrogen Peroxide Dip

Start with a visual inspection of the plants in good lighting. Any small bugs like thirps and mites should be removed by hand prior to starting. Thin the clones out so only a coupe of small leaves remain at the top. Leave the stems as long as possible. Much like a bouquet of flowers this will help keep the cutting alive longer.

Fully submerge the plants in the peroxide for a minimum of 1 minute and a maximum of 10 minutes. I usually do 1-2 minutes as going longer than this can really stunt the plants and damage the plant tissue.

Stage 2: Potassium Salt Rinse

Use a vegetable safe insecticidal soap to rinse the plants after the peroxide dip. Hold by the top of the stalk and spray down. Shaking off any excess.

Stage 3: Emulsified Neem Oil Dunk

Dip clones in the emulsified neem oil and stir vigorously. Neem oil has natural insecticidal and fungicidal properties. I have had no issue using neem oil on plants in the vegetative state. I would not spray flowering plants with buds as the neem oil has a strong flavour can overpower the flower.

Azadirachtin is the most well known and studied triterpenoid in neem oil. It is known to affect over 200 species of insects, by acting mainly as an antifeedant and growth disruptor. Azadirachtin fulfills many of the criteria needed for a good insecticide. Azadirachtin is biodegradable (it degrades within 100 hours when exposed to light and water) and shows very low toxicity to mammals (the LD₅₀ in rats is > 3,540 mg/kg making it practically non-toxic).

Stage 4: Quarantine and Re-treat with Neem Oil Spray

The above method is great for killing adult insects but eggs can still survive. For this reason it is important to quarnatine and re-treat the plants for 10-14 days. This will ensure you remove all generations of insects, no matter which stage of their life cycle they are at.

The clones should then be put into an aeroponics cloner. I prefer aeroponics cloners over rockwool because rockwool can harbour eggs, the foam collars are more sanitary and can be sprayed down with neem oil without absorbing it.

Place clones into a small veg tent or quarantine room that is separate from your bug free plants.

Fill a 1 gallon pressure sprayer with the emulsified neem-oil solution, making more if necessary. Treat every 2-3 days at exactly the time that your lights turn off. Soak the plants entirely, making sure to get underneath and on top of the leaves.

As mentioned above no clone remediation strategy is 100% full-proof but this should get you as clean as is possible without tissue culture or harsh systemic pesticides. I used this method to fully remediate 20 outdoor clones (exotic genetics) with no pest or PM brought into the room.

Happy Growing!